Food System

How do our personal food choices and the food system (locally and globally) impact personal, public and planetary health?

Food systems affect the global climate when greenhouse gases are emitted by growing and transporting food, by wasting food, by depleting the soil and through deforestation. But with regeneration in mind, food systems can contribute to the well-being of individuals, communities, farmers, workers, and the land on which food is grown. Here are resources related to some of those factors:

Reduce wastage of food

Reducing food waste avoids deforestation of additional farmland, conserves our precious resources, and could help feed more people in the world. Here are some findings of the U.N.’s Food and Agriculture Organization 2012 report:

About 1/3 of the food produced every year – enough to feed 3 billion people – gets wasted in our current food system.

If food waste was a country, it would be the third largest emitter of greenhouse gases globally, just behind the U.S. and China.

If food waste winds up in landfills, it decomposes and emits methane, a more lethal greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide. Food waste can be composted to create a rich fertilizer.

In addition, the resources – water, land, energy, labor, and capital – used to grow the food, are themselves wasted, and produce roughly 8% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions.

“The most powerful aspect of the local food movement is not that it cuts down on food miles (which the Our World in Data article correctly points out is not as significant as the GHG emissions of production practices), but the fact that when food is local, you almost always have the ability to find out more about how that food was produced. Some farms are open to visitors and many have public trails and roads along their fields where you can get some fresh air and also get to know the farm’s practices season-by-season. CSA farms are often especially welcoming to customer interest in practices, due to their deeper commitment to a direct customer relationship with the farm. But even with non-CSA farms it is usually possible for you to talk to the farmer or the crew and explore their commitment to soil stewardship.”

“Gabe Brown began farming in North Dakota almost 30 years ago. His land, having been conventionally farmed, was low in fertility, had poor water retention and native grasslands were in poor health. He implemented no-till farming, holistic grazing, and other regenerative practices. Now, his soil organic matter has increased from 2% to 8%, the soil infiltration rate has increased 16 times, and his corn yield is 20% higher than the county average.

“Farms can create wildlife habitats and restore water cycles. Nutrient dense food can pull carbon out of the air and sequester it in the earth. Our money can support farmers who are treated fairly and work to build healthy soil. And yes, it can be done while feeding the world. But first, we need to change the discussion.”

Support nutrient dense food production

Ecological Outcome Verification is a standard scientists and researchers around the world developed. It is an empirical and scalable soil and landscape assessment methodology used to track outcomes in soil health, biodiversity, and ecosystem function.

FAO

From soil biology to the human biome, a healthy relationship

Food can be grown degeneratively (losing soil carbon, causing soil erosion, reducing biodiversity, and polluting groundwater), sustainably (holding soil organic matters stable in the soil and not contributing to biodiversity loss or watershed pollution) or regeneratively (sequestering soil carbon in the form of soil organic matter, enhancing water storing and cleaning capacity, and enhancing biodiversity). The difference between degenerative and regenerative farming is how well the farmers care for the complexity of the living things in the soil—the fungi, the bacteria, the insects and other life forms.

Support farming that works with nature

Innovative farmer Ernst Gotsch in Brazil developed a philosophy and practice called Syntropic agriculture. Syntropic agriculture translates natural processes into farming interventions, putting regeneration behind a system that is independent of inputs and irrigation.The resulting ecosystem services form soil, regulate microclimates and promote water cycles. View the 2-minute introduction video or the 15-minute ‘Life in Syntropy’ on their website or on youtube